Wednesday, 27 June 2018

Read in 2018 - 8: Narrow Margins

Surprise, surprise: another free ebook I found years ago on Amazon's Kindle shop!

It took me a few chapters to
get into the story, but then I quite enjoyed the book and was looking
forward to finding out what was going to happen next.

Marie Browne tells her own
story here. She and her husband run their own successful business
(IT support and project management, if I remember correctly) until their biggest client
goes broke and leaves their bills unpaid.

This leads to the couple
having to face an uncertain future, with only one thing being clear:
Things can not stay as they are, and they can not keep the house.

The decision is made to sell
up, buy a narrow boat and live on that.

How they chose a boat and turn
it into a home (this takes many months), learn the ropes of moving the
boat along without too much harm to themselves, the boat and others,
adapt to life on the water, manage minor and major crises and eventually
find they are happier than ever before in their lives is told in an
unpretentious way, with a good portion of humour thrown in.

Not always the kind of humour
that makes me laugh, but humour anyway. And you can tell the author is
not a practised or "learned" writer; she rather describes the day-to-day
happenings as if you'd be reading someone's blog or emails from a
friend.

I liked the descriptions of
life aboard the boat and, even though I have never travelled on one, I
can imagine it well. I've often seen narrow boats on Ripon Canal
and elsewhere.

Would it be for me? Hmm... not
sure. I guess I'd miss the comfort and space of a "proper" flat,
central heating and reliably hot showers, as well as the familiarity of
going to "my" bakery on the corner, of seeing the neigbhours, friends
and family I like on a regular basis.

It is certainly a different way of life, and I enjoyed reading about it.

I wish Marie Browne and her family all the best - whereever they may be these days.

Click here for a BBC article with pictures about Marie, the boat and the family's life on board.

My older sister and her husband have just this month moved back to a home on land after spending 20+ years on a sternwheeler on the Ohio River. My brother-in-law built three sternwheelers in his lifetime, the one they were living on was the smallest. How they did it that long, I don't know. My sister weaves rugs and had a small trailer on the banks of the river where she worked and big enough to hold her looms and supplies. Maybe she should now write a book about her experiences....hadn't thought of that before!

Your sister's life definitely sounds like material for a book - and I would make sure to read it, if you'd let us know about it through your blog :-)I hope they did not move back because of health issues or other unpleasant things.